Our Most Popular Online Content in 2022

With 2022 done and dusted, we've dived into our online statistics for the year. We were delighted to have welcomed 48,655 people to our website 63,718 times! If you're counted in that number, thanks for stopping by!

Below are the top ten most popular pages on our website in the year that was 2022, which is a nice blend of state-wide and local history content.

1. Index of Western Australian Teachers
Topping the list was our index of state school teachers in Western Australia from 1900 to 1980, which was compiled from historic editions of The Education Circular.

2. Biographical Dictionary
Our continually expanding Biographical Dictionary of Coorow, Carnamah and Three Springs comes in at number two. We've listed the most popular biographies in a supplementary list further below.

3. Index of Western Australian License Plates
Number three is our index of early Western Australian motor vehicle registrations, which spans the years 1915 to 1928. This great index was compiled from the RAC's Year Book & Road Guides which listed every registered vehicle in the state!

4. Virtual Museum
Our virtual museum of 14 online exhibitions continues to be a crowd-pleaser. Its exhibitions showcase objects, images and stories from our collection.

5. Midland Railway
Speaking of our virtual museum, its exhibition on the Midland Railway is yet again one of our most popular pages.

6. Cemeteries
Our cemetery index spanning the Mingenew Moora, Perenjori, Three Springs and Winchester cemeteries comes in at number six.

7. Schools
Our online exhibition on schools across Carnamah, Coorow and Three Springs is a surprise appearance in the year's top ten.

8. Macpherson Homestead
Our eighth most popular page was our visitor info for the historic Macpherson Homestead, located just one kilometre east of the Carnamah townsite on the Bunjil-Carnamah Road.

9. Three Springs History
As with previous years, our early history of Three Springs continues to be one of our most well-read pages.

10. Before Electricity
Our online exhibition on life prior to electricity comes in at number ten, which is no surprise as it is widely used in classrooms across WA and further afield.

Our Biographical Dictionary contains information on thousands of people with connections to Carnamah, Coorow, Three Springs and other nearby places. Below were the most viewed entries in the dictionary during 2022.

1. Local bushranger Frank Thomas

2. Bishop Rosendo Salvado of the Benedictine Monastery in New Norcia

3. Shepherd and farmhand Joachim Dido of Carnamah

4. Granny Latham of Coorow (Mary Oliver / Latham)

6. Sarah Campbell of Arrino

7. Renowned building contractor and later the world's largest individual farmer Gus Liebe of Waddy Forest

8. Scottish born Duncan Macpherson who established the pastoral station 'Carnamah' in the 1860s

9. Albert Nebrong, the son of Aboriginal woman Mary Wirbina and a member of the Macpherson family

10. Carnamah farmhand, shearer and farm manager Teddy Edwards

Celebrating 150 Years of Carnamah's Macpherson Homestead

The family of Duncan and Mary Macpherson shifted to Carnamah in 1868. The family of ten initially squeezed into a three room cottage near the Yarra Yarra Lakes before building a much larger homestead Carnamah House in 1869. 

Carnamah House, now known as the Macpherson Homestead. is turning 150 years old in 2019. The homestead is located one kilometre east of the Carnamah townsite via a sign-posted driveway off the Bunjil-Carnamah Road.

A series of activities are occurring over Saturday 4th and Sunday 5th of May to mark 150 years of this Carnamah landmark.

For more info on the family and their historic homestead, check out:

• Virtual Museum: Macpherson Family
• Visitor Info for the Macpherson Homestead

Now online - 10863 Bushranger presented by Act-Belong-Commit

In 2017 the North Midlands Project and The Bank Gallery Space in Carnamah hosted Di Taylor as their inaugural artist-in-residence. One of the outcomes of Di's residency was a series of artworks exploring the life and stories of our local bushranger Frank Thomas.

The artworks created by Di Taylor culminated in the exhibition 10863 Bushranger presented by Act-Belong-Commit. The exhibition was launched at The Bank Gallery Space in Carnamah and toured to both the Sunshine Festival in Geraldton and to the historic Fremantle Prison in Perth.

Incredibly, the exhibition about this largely unknown bushranger reached over 23,000 people within its first four months! We're delighted to announce that we recently played a role in bringing the exhibition to even more people by reproducing it within the Virtual Museum on our website. You can now check it out online via the below link...

10863 Bushranger presented by Act-Belong-Commit

You're Invited to Carnamah: 15-19 September 2017

North Midlands Project artist-in-residence Di Taylor has created a series of artworks based on the stories and life of our local bushranger Frank Thomas. This striking exhibition will open for the first time at 6:30pm this Friday 15 September 2017 at The Bank Gallery Space in Carnamah. This is a free event.

Red Hills by Di Taylor

Also launching on Friday evening, 15 September 2017, is the North Midlands Agricultural Society's biennial Art & Photography Exhibition at the Town Hall in Carnamah. Tickets can be purchased on the door for $20 with refreshments provided. Entertainment during the evening includes WA singer-songwriter Ashlea Reale, who will be singing Hold on to Your Horse (about bushranger Frank Thomas) and songs written earlier this year with students in Carnamah, Morawa and Perenjori.

The Bank Gallery Space, NMAS Art & Photography Exhibition and our Carnamah Museum will all be open from 10am to 4pm from Saturday 16th of September through to Tuesday 19th of September.

Carnamah an 'Inspiring Example' in Participatory Heritage

Back in 2015 we had a chat over Skype with Courtney Ruge, a postgraduate student at Monash University. We've just discovered that some of our insights have contributed to the chapter Custodianship and Online Sharing in Australia in the book Participatory Heritage, which was published in London earlier this year.

A portion of the chapter reads:

"In spite of the issues that appear to be prevalent within the majority of local Australian historical societies, there are examples that demonstrate the potential benefits of image sharing. The Carnamah Historical Society ('Carnamah'; www.carnamah.com.au) provides an inspiring example of what can be achieved when a historical society embraces online platforms. Carnamah believes that its collections belong to the public, having been freely donated to the Society by members of the public, and has significantly raised its profile due to its take-up of social media, making use of an extensive array of platforms including Facebook, Twitter, a blog, Pinterest, Instagram and Flickr. Carnamah also facilitates audience engagement, encouraging collaboration and co-curation by facilitating the contribution of stories about the images featured. As a result of these efforts, the Society won the 2015 Western Australian Heritage Award and is now featured in Landmarks, a permanent exhibition at the National Museum of Australia."

Participatory Heritage, edited by Henriette Roued-Cunliffe and Andrea Copeland, was published by Facet Publishing in London, England in 2017.

Australian Heritage Festival in Carnamah on 30 April 2017

We invite you to attend Carnamah's first-ever contribution to the Australian Heritage Festival! From 10am to 2-30pm on Sunday 30 April 2017 there are a series of things to do and see in Carnamah.

Attractions

The old bank building across the road from our museum has undergone a transformation over the past two years and will be opening for the first time as The Bank Gallery Space. Pressed metal ceilings, wooden floors and other features have been uncovered and are once again visible for the first time in decades.

The public is invited to see the restored octagonal-shaped bank chamber, strong room and manager's office. There will be an exhibition about the history of the building, live painting by North Midlands artist-in-residence Di Taylor, children's art activities and a display of four large artworks created by schools in Carnamah, Coorow, Perenjori and Three Springs. Rooms at the back of the building, to accommodate an artist-in-residence, will also be open.

Acoustic singer-songwriter Ashlea Reale will be performing on Macpherson Street. Ashlea has helped create a number of unique songs based on stories from Western Australia's history - including one on a character from our neck of the woods!

The state heritage-listed Macpherson Homestead, which was built in the late 1860s, will be open during the same hours. It is located just one kilometre east of town via a signposted driveway on the Bunjil Road. Originally known as Carnamah House, it was home to the Macpherson family for 70 years. They established the pastoral station Carnamah and a number of their sons spread northwards with connections to Arrino, Yandanooka, Greenough and the Murchison.

Our very own Carnamah Museum will also be open. The older part of our building was constructed in 1926 as a tearooms but was later used as a branch of the sports betting agency TAB. It has been our museum since 1992 and was substantially extended over 2011 and 2012. We have a diverse collection that explores the agricultural, commercial, social, sporting and domestic past of Carnamah and surrounding districts.

Entry to all three is FREE! 


Food & Drink

The Carnamah Post Office & Bush Basket will be open to sell fresh roasted coffees and hot chocolates while the Carnamah Hotel will be open for lunch. Our thanks to both for opening outside of their normal hours.


About the Festival

The Australian Heritage Festival is Australia’s biggest annual community-driven heritage festival. Western Australia's contribution to the festival involves around 130 events and tens of thousands of visitors each year.  The WA festival program of natural, Aboriginal and historic focused events provides an opportunity for communities, individuals, governments and organisations to celebrate the places and events that have shaped our heritage.


The Main Info

Date - Sunday 30 April 2017
Time - 10am to 2-30pm
Where - Carnamah, Western Australia

Boys Foraging by Di Taylor, 2017 Artist in Residence for the North Midlands

Online Index of 80,153 Early WA Motor Vehicle Registrations

The Royal Automobile Club (R.A.C.) of Western Australia historically published an annual Year Book & Road Guide. Some of the early editions included lists of every registered motor vehicle in Western Australia. The lists included the owner, their address, the type of vehicle, its license/number plate and the local authority it was registered with.

In partnership with the North Midlands Project we have transcribed, indexed and created a searchable online database of motor vehicle registrations from throughout Western Australia (extracted from the R.A.C. Year Book & Road Guides of 1917-18, 1922-23, 1924-25, 1925-26, 1926-27 and 1927-28). A great many thanks are due to those who worked so hard to transcribe, check and reformat this wealth of information, which can now be searched via the below link...

Index of Early WA Motor Vehicle Registrations

www.carnamah.com.au/car-registrations

Arthur & Florence White of Sun Holme Farm in Winchester with their sports model Buick

The index contains 80,153 entries, comprised from the following years:

3,324 vehicles in 1917-18

5,495 vehicles in 1922-23

10,693 vehicles in 1924-25
15,322 vehicles in 1925-26

19,975 vehicles in 1926-27

25,344 vehicles in 1927-28

The growth in vehicles during the ten years from 1917-18 to 1927-28 was over 762 percent!

During this period the most popular make was undoubtedly Ford (28% of all registrations) followed by Chevrolet (12%), Dodge (11%), Overland (7%), Buick (5%), Rugby (3%), Studebaker (3%), Essex (3%), Hupmobile (2%) and then Morris, Fiat, Maxwell and Chrysler (1% each). Other brands, with a less than 1% market share included Reo, Citroen, Austin, Oldsmobile, Willys-Knight, International, Graham, Whippet, Republic, Pontiac, Swift, General Motors Company (G.M.C.), Leyland, Guy and Vauxhall.

The index reveals that some people went through a number of vehicles in the space of ten years. For example, F. J. Enhardt of Dowerin didn't own a vehicle in 1917-18 but in 1922-23 he had a 19-horsepower Ford with the number plate D●11. He retained his plate but by 1924-25 he'd got rid of the Ford and owned a Maxwell. Two years later in 1926-27 he'd changed again and had D●11 on a Chrysler.

It may appear that multiple people had the same number plate at the same time. However, this was generally not the case. Some local governments used the same numbering (but on different coloured plates) for private vehicles and those for trade or hire. In other places, such as Narrogin, there was both a road board and a municipal council - the former would include the dot in the middle while the latter contained no dot.

Sometimes the road board and municipal council would use different letters, but not always! For instance, in 1926-27 the Albany Road Board's plates were A followed by a dot and the Albany Municipal Council also used used A but without a dot - hence both A●21 and A 21 both existed but were on different vehicles owned by different people!

If anyone wishes to view the digitised R.A.C. Year Book & Road Guides, they can be found and viewed within the catalogue of the State Library of Western Australia. Our new index, which can be searched by surname or keyword, can be found via the below link...

Index of Early WA Motor Vehicle Registrations

www.carnamah.com.au/car-registrations

Carnamah Museum Collection of National Significance

We're delighted to reveal that we have been awarded a Community Heritage Grant for a significance assessment of our museum collection. One of the great things about this grant is that it means our collection has been deemed to be of national significance.

Recipients of Community Heritage Grants at the National Library of Australia in Canberra

An additional part of the grant is to send a representative to the National Library of Australia in Canberra, to both officially receive the grant and to undergo training on assessing and caring for museum collections.

Pictured above is our beaming representative Shiona Herbert (right) with Hon. Zed Seselja, Assistant Minister for Social Services and Multicultural Affairs, who was representing Senator the Hon. Mitch Fifield, Minister for the Arts.

We'd like to extend our congratulations to all of the other grant recipients, which are listed here, but would especially like to congratulate a fellow Mid West collection in the Greenough Museum & Gardens, who received a grant for a significance assessment of their Maley Archive.

Community Heritage Grants are funded by the Australian Government through the National Library of Australia, the Ministry for the Arts, the National Archives of Australia, the National Film and Sound Archive and the National Museum of Australia. Our heartfelt thanks to all of the funders, to Andrew Bowman-Bright for managing our project and to Shiona Herbert for flying the Carnamah flag in Canberra!

Dr Joanna Sassoon has been appointed to undertake our significance assessment in early 2017.

Virtual Museum: Before Electricity

Electricity runs the world but this hasn't always been the case. Our latest online exhibition takes a look at a collection of items used on a regular basis in the days before electricity...

www.carnamah.com.au/before-electricity

Back in 2014 we undertook a public poll of 25 potential online exhibitions that could be added to our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah. We've kept the results a secret as we always intended to develop both the top voted themes but also those that received the least votes!

Before Electricity and Books & Publications are the first of our new exhibitions.

Virtual Musuem: Books & Publications

Back in 2014 we undertook a public poll of 25 potential online exhibitions that could be added to our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah. We've kept the results a secret as we always intended to develop both the top voted themes but also those that received the least votes!

The rationale of this was to give the majority of people what they wanted but to also challenge ourselves to create an engaging exhibition that people voted not to see! Which will prove most popular in the end? We'll have to wait and see!

We'd like to draw your attention to the first of our four new online exhibitions on Books & Publications, which takes a lighthearted look at some of the books and other publications that can be found on the shelves at our museum. We've got nursery rhymes, awful recipes, wearable books and much more!

www.carnamah.com.au/books

We'd like to thank the Department of Culture and the Arts (DCA) for supporting this project to share and promote more of our museum collection with the broader community. Before we go, we'll share one of the images that didn't quite make the final cut. It shows the fashions of 1979 and is a cover of the Australian Woman's World magazine.

MMXV: Features of 2015

"Carnamah Historical Society and Museum's website and, in particular, it's Virtual Museum and Biographical Dictionary are one of Australia's biggest online success stories." - Museums & Galleries NSW


First World War

April marked the centenary of the Anzac landings on the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey. We marked the occasion with the launch of a new virtual exhibition on the First World War as well as a physical exhibition within our museum (the latter being in partnership with the WA Museum). A request to say a word or two at Carnamah's dawn service quickly escalated into us being handed the baton to give the official address, and for such an auspicious anniversary.

Links:  First World War virtual exhibition  |  Transcript of Anzac Day speech 

"I used your... virtual museum exhibition in my year 7-10 classes at Carnamah DHS today as a lead up to Anzac Day. The students were thoroughly engaged by the stories particularly as they featured local soldiers and names they could relate to. It provided a great springboard for some fantastic discussion. Thanks for such a fantastic and timely resource."

Major Jack Colpitts of Heppleholme Farm in Winchester, South Carnamah

Macpherson Homestead

It's been a year of highs and lows for the old and wonderful Macpherson Homestead.

We were delighted to welcome a special group of visitors during the year, which included Oriel Green (nee Bartlett), her sisters and a number of their relatives and friends. Oriel spent a portion of her childhood in Carnamah and Three Springs during the 1930s but what made the visit more momentous was that her family are believed to be Aboriginal descendants of the Macpherson family.

Another high was our first steps toward the homestead hosting primary school excursions. Our thanks to Ignite Your Audience for their work so far and to the Three Springs Primary School for being our enthusiastic test-subjects!

Sadly the conserved ruins of the bakehouse at the homestead began to rapidly and suddenly deteriorate in October. Huge cracks spread through the walls and a large section began to collapse. However, we're pleased to report that the collapsed section has been restored and the remainder has been solidified and conserved to ensure the ruin will continue to stand strong.

Western Australian Heritage Awards

For the second year in a row, we were a finalist in the community organisation category of the WA Heritage Awards and were stoked to be named this year's winner.

"Carnamah Historical Society & Museum uses cutting-edge technology to engage with and promote the heritage of, not only their own and neighbouring districts, but also the State. Impressively, the society has established a virtual volunteering platform that has engaged 7,000 people with online heritage projects, which, in turn has provided a valuable resource for historians and the State."

Australian Curriculum Resources

For a few years we had been working hard, in partnership with Ignite Your Audience, to create a suite of Australian Curriculum education resources. Our completed range of nine resources, which relate to primary years, were promoted at the History Teachers' conference in Mount Lawley and the third History TeachMeet in Peppermint Grove. The resources are a little different - as they can be used with school visits to our physical museum or from classrooms anywhere in Australia (with our virtual museum and other online content).

Link:  Carnamah Historical Society & Museum's Australian Curriculum resources

We've received a lot of favourable comments, including glowing feedback from the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra! We were especially delighted when our resources received a Highly Commended in the Interpretation, Audience and Learning Engagement category of the Museums and Galleries National Awards.

Museums and Galleries National Awards

The Museums and Galleries National Awards, or MAGNAs, are conducted annually by Museums Australia and are held during the national museums conference. This year's conference was in Sydney and we had a few reasons to go. Both our education resources and our virtual volunteering program were short-listed in different categories and we're pleased to say they each received a Highly Commended. Not a bad effort considering the competition was mostly state and national institutions!

 
In the Media and in Parliament!

Our achievements of recent years were featured in the Museums Australia magazine, on the blog of Museums & Galleries NSW and in the Heritage Council of WA's Heritage Matters magazine. We were also honoured in the lower house of the Western Australian Parliament on 21 May 2015 when Shane Love, the MLA for Moore, spoke about our endeavours and successes.

Thank you

Our thanks to you for being part of our 2015 - whether it was online to our blog, Virtual Museum or Biographical Dictionary, or as a physical visitor to see our history and heritage on the ground in Carnamah.

We'd also like to thank those who supported us during the year. Special thanks are due to all of our virtual volunteers, to project partners atWork Australia and the North Midlands Project, and to financial supporters the Department of Culture and the Arts (DCA) and the Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program.

If you're ever in Carnamah, we invite you to stop by:

• Carnamah Museum
• Macpherson Homestead 

A proud moment for Work for the Dole virtual volunteering project

Originally published in the News section on the Department of Employment's website on 20 July 2015.

A group of young Western Australian job seekers has been recognised for their contribution to a successful "virtual volunteering" Work for the Dole project jointly hosted by atWork Australia and the Carnamah Historical Society & Museum in WA.

This unique project, which involved transcribing and indexing over 6,000 historical records, has assisted with the conservation, documentation and promotion of the local heritage of Carnamah, a farming community 320km north of Perth.

The hard work of these Work for the Dole “virtual volunteers” has resulted in a useful online resource which provides the community with access to a large number of searchable historical records including burial registers, electoral roles and biographical index cards.

Michael Kolomyjec, Divisional Manager of atWork Australia said “the project directly benefits the broader community by increasing accessibility of cultural heritage collections”.

“The project also gave our young job seekers a range of transferable work related skills and experience including communication in the workplace, confidence building, data entry and team work”.

The value of this project and the contribution of these Work for the Dole participants was recognised at the recent Museums and Galleries National Awards in Sydney where the Carnamah Historical Society received a Highly Commended Award for Virtual Volunteering.

Following receipt of the award, Andrew Bowman of the Carnamah Historical Society met with the project participants and personally thanked them for their hard work and for making the virtual volunteering project such a success.

A proud moment for Work for the Dole virtual volunteering project http://t.co/KgQISFIdw8

— EmploymentGovAU (@EmploymentGovAU) July 20, 2015

We've made it into the news of the Department of Employment! So many thanks to our helpers and atWork Australia http://t.co/WdCJMY8NRz

— Carnamah HS & Museum (@carnamah) July 21, 2015

atWork Australia delighted to work on this project with @carnamah https://t.co/ndG3535mDl

— The WorkFocus Group (@WorkFocusGroup) July 21, 2015

Double short-listing in the Museums & Galleries National Awards!

2015 is shaping up to be quite the year for this little historical society! The short-list for the 2015 Museums and Galleries National Awards was announced today and we found ourselves among the list not once, but twice!

We're a contender in the Innovation category for Virtual Volunteering and are also in the running in the Interpretation, Learning and Audience Engagement category for our Australian Curriculum Education Resources. The winners will be announced at an awards ceremony on 22 May 2015 at the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney.

We were honoured at last year's awards as the Level 1 Permanent Exhibition or Gallery Fitout winner for our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah.

Our virtual museum inspired the State Library of WA Foundation to create a virtual exhibition on Western Australia's Freycinet Collection... and we're pleased to reveal that it too is a finalist in this year's awards - in the category that we won last year!

2015 Winner at the Western Australian Heritage Awards

On the evening of the 15 April the atmospheric Hackett Hall at the WA Museum in Perth played host to the 2015 Western Australian Heritage Awards. The annual awards are a celebration of our state's heritage champions and we were delighted to yet again be a finalist in the community organisation category... which we won!

The judge's citation reads: Carnamah Historical Society and Museum uses cutting-edge technology to engage with and promote the heritage of, not only their own and neighbouring districts, but also the State. Impressively, the society has established a virtual volunteering platform that has engaged 7,000 people with online heritage projects, which, in turn has provided a valuable resource for historians and the State.


We spoke to radio presenter Glenn Barndon of ABC Mid West & Wheatbelt following the win:




The full list of winners and commendations are listed below. For more info check out the winners page on the website of the State Heritage Office or the media release by Hon. Albert Jacob, M.L.A.


Voluntary individual contribution
Winner: Dr Howard Gray, Geraldton

Professional contribution
Winner: Dr John Taylor, Claremont

Contribution by a community-based organisation
Winner: Carnamah Historical Society and Museum
Commendation: Historical Society of Cockburn

Contribution by a public or private organisation
Winner: Heritage Perth

Heritage practices by a local government
Winner: City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder

Interpretation project
Winner: Albany Forts (Princess Royal Fortress)
Commendation: Esperance Foreshore Interpretation Project

Heritage tourism project
Winner: National Anzac Centre, Albany

Conservation or adaptive reuse of a State registered place
Winner of the Gerry Gauntlett Award: Wanslea - Cancer Wellness Centre, Cottesloe

The Judges’ Award: The Professor David Dolan Award
Ms Norma Andrews, Harwood’s Cottage Cafe and Quindalup Post Office of Busselton


We'd like to express our thanks to the Heritage Council and State Heritage Office for the award. We'd also like to pay tribute to our members, volunteers and virtual volunteers - this award is thanks to our collective efforts!

2015 Western Australian Heritage Awards

The finalists for the 2015 Western Australian Heritage Awards were announced this morning and we are very excited to be listed among the community organisations! In total, there are 43 finalists across eight categories, which are listed in full below. More info on each of the finalists can be found here.

Voluntary individual contribution

• Norma Andrews of Busselton
• Councillor Laurie Ayers of Kalgoorlie-Boulder
• Dr Howard Gray of Geraldton
• Peter Snow of Albany

Professional contribution

• Martin Colgan of Northbridge.
• The late Ian Hocking of Shenton Park
• Tom Perrigo of Perth
• Dr John Taylor of Claremont
• Malcolm Traill of Albany

Contribution by a community-based organisation

• Carnamah Historical Society & Museum
• Guildford Association
• Historical Society of Cockburn
• Jaycees Community Foundation Inc
• Kalamunda & Districts Historical Society
• Maritime Archaeological Association of Western Australia
• Mount Lawley Society
• Slater Homestead Group Advisory Body to the Shire of Goomalling

Contribution by a public or private organisation

• City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder for the Burt Street Heritage Precinct
• Colgan Industries
• Heritage Perth

Heritage practices by a local government

• City of Albany
• City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder
• Shire of Northam

Interpretation project

• Albany Forts (Princess Royal Fortress)
• Discovery Bay’s Historic Whaling Station
• Esperance Foreshore Interpretation Project
• hiLIGHTS - celebrating 125 years of the State Library of Western Australia
• Old Port at Arthur Head Reserve
• Original Railway Station, Geraldton
• Shipwrecks of WA smart phone app by the Maritime Archaeological Association of Western Australia
• Tranby House (Peninsula Farm)

Heritage tourism project

• Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse
• Discovery Bay’s Historic Whaling Station
• National Anzac Centre
• Rottnest Island Wadjemup Walk Trail

Conservation or adaptive reuse of a State Registered place

• District Medical Officer's Quarters (now Dome Cafe Port Hedland)
• Duke’s Inn, Northam
• Harwood’s Cottage and Café, Busselton
• McNess Royal Arcade facade restoration, Perth
• Old Port at Arthur Head Reserve, Fremantle
• Old Railway Station, Geraldton
• Stirling Terrace enhancement, Albany
• Wanslea - Cancer Wellness Centre, Cottesloe

The winners were announced on 15 April 2015 and we won! For more, see our blog post 2015 winner at the Western Australian Heritage Awards.

Suite of Australian Curriculum Education Resources

In partnership with Ignite Your Audience we have developed a suite of nine freely downloadable Australian Curriculum education resources. However, they're museum resources with a difference! They can be used with school visits to our physical museum but can also be utilised from classrooms anywhere in Australia with our award-winning virtual museum.

If you're a primary school teacher then we have something for you! Resources from Foundation to Year 6 include an overview for teachers, worksheets, activities, extension ideas and their connections to the Australian Curriculum.

www.carnamah.com.au/education

www.carnamah.com.au/education

We'd like to thank the Western Australian History Foundation and the Government of Western Australia Department of Culture and the Arts for their invaluable support of this project. Special thanks are due to Maree Whiteley for her encouragement, Shiona Herbert for her inspirational skill and Salleigh Walters for her worthy contributions.

We'd also like to thank Museums Australia WA, the History Teachers' Association of WA and TeachMeetWA (lots of WA in there!) for allowing us to share and promote our project and its outcomes at conferences, workshops and presentations. If you're a teacher and attending the 2015 HTAWA Conference in Mount Lawley on 28 March, we are taking part in the Show & Tell session at 1:45pm!

Perth Festival's The Giants and a Carnamah connection!

The major attraction of this year's Perth International Arts Festival is The Giants, who launched the festival on 13 February and continued to wow Perth crowds over the following weekend. A large part of the story behind the little girl giant is the teenage life of Fay Howe, who resided with her father Robert Wilkinson Howe on Breaksea Island off the coast of Albany.

Inspiring the Little Girl Giant: Breaksea Island's Lighthouse Girl 
by Karla Arnall of ABC Great Southern WA

"Fay Howe was 15 years old at the outset of World War I. Living with her lighthouse keeper father on the remote Breaksea Island, the young girl began responding to signals sent by soldiers onboard ships bound for Gallipoli and Egypt. Fay relayed semaphore messages to their loved ones via telegram and received their postcards from the frontline. She is regarded as one of the last points of contact with Australia for many who did not return. 

Fay's story was unveiled by Albany author, Dianne Wolfer, in her 2009 book Lighthouse Girl, which imagines her existence on the island. The narrative struck a chord with Royal De Luxe company director, Jean-Luc Courcoult, who visited Albany in 2014 looking for inspiration to tour his Giants." 

[Full article at http://www.abc.net.au/local/photos/2015/02/13/4179610.htm]

Carnamah connections!

Fay's father Robert and stepmother Emily both resided in Carnamah, years later in 1942, when the world was in its second global conflict. After retiring from lighthouse keeping, they had shifted to Perth but fled north to Carnamah when Darwin was bombed by the Japanese.

Fay's stepbrother Ned Wells ran the Wells & Wells Pyramid Tea & Dining Rooms in Carnamah for many years - a building that is now our museum!

MMXIV: Highlights from 2014

During 2014 one of our most popular blog posts was 2013: The Year in Review. We've taken that statistic as a mandate for a similar post to recap some of our highlights from 2014.

Biographical Dictionary

It was the end of an era as we bid farewell to our much-loved Coorow-Waddy, Carnamah-Winchester and Three Springs databases. It wasn't bad news though, as they joined forces to become a new and improved Biographical Dictionary. The new online dictionary is much easier to search and navigate, includes photographs and streamlines contributions from members of the public.

Museums and Galleries National Award

Our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah was the Level 1 winner of the Permanent Exhibition category at the 2014 Museums and Galleries National Awards. The judge's summarised us as "A small society with an innovative solution to extending their audience and sharing a larger proportion of their collection with the community. The website is very creative with excellent production values and interpretative images and narratives."

Memories of the Midland Railway

The privately owned Midland Railway was purchased by the Government of Western Australia in 1964. To mark 50 years since the takeover, we accepted an invitation to collaborate with Rail Heritage WA to gather memories and stories of what was affectionately known as the family railway. Many of the stories have been featured in the book Memories of the Midland Railway Co. of Western Australia by Philippa Rogers. Copies of the book can be purchased at our museum or alternatively some of the stories can be read at the end of our virtual exhibition on the Midland Railway.

During the year we completed, in partnership with Ignite Your Audience, an education resource on the Midland Railway. It links to years five and six of the Australian History Curriculum and is freely available for teachers via our Education Resources page. We also published Jeff Austin's histories on the railway's Stations & Sidings.

Virtual Volunteering

We did it! Hundreds of online volunteers, and especially a dedicated few, have successfully text-corrected and transcribed all of our local electoral rolls for the Commonwealth subdivisions of Irwin and Moore from 1903 to 1969. We are presently amalgamating the transcriptions into a single index to be published online.

During 2014 our Virtual Volunteering website has also hosted the virtual transcription of WA Biographical Index cards for the State Library of Western Australia. Thousands of helpers have transcribed over 30,000 cards... but there's still plenty more to go!

Carnamah Museum

As with every year, we have been kept busy running our museum and caring for the state heritage-listed Macpherson Homestead. If you're ever in Carnamah or passing through, we invite you to come and say hello. Our museum is open Friday afternoons or at any other time by prior arrangement.

We've been named in Inside History's 2014 Top 50 Blogs!

We're delighted to reveal that our blog has been named in Inside History magazine's Top 50 Blogs for 2014. The Top 50 takes a look at some of the best blogs by Australian and New Zealand institutions, organisations, genealogists and historical societies. We're honoured to make the list for the second time, having also appeared in the inaugural Top 50 in 2012.

To mark the occasion, we've taken a close look at our blog's stats to see what posts have proved the most popular over the past year:

• Moora Public Cemetery: Stories from the Grave
• Memories of the Midland Railway Company of Western Australia
• We've come home with a Museums & Galleries National Award

Memories of the Midland Railway Company of Western Australia

Last year we partnered with Rail Heritage WA and the Walkaway Station Museum to collect memories and stories of the Midland Railway. Unlike other railways in Western Australia, the Midland Railway was privately owned and run for 70 years. It is often affectionately referred to as 'the family railway'.

A selection of the stories we gathered have been featured in the book Memories of the Midland Railway Company of Western Australia by Philippa Rogers.

The book was launched by the Federal Member for Perth, Alannah MacTiernan, on Sunday afternoon 10 August 2014 - before a crowd aptly seated between train engines and carriages at the Railway Museum in Bassendean.

The book is available for purchase for $19.90 at our Carnamah Museum, which is located at 10 Macpherson Street, Carnamah and is open Friday afternoons from 1-30 to 5pm. You can also check out the stories we gathered along with our virtual exhibition on the railway at www.carnamah.com.au/midland-railway

We'd like to extend our thanks to the wonderful people who responded to our call for memories and stories of the railway. If you have any recollections we'd love to hear about them! We strongly encourage you to get in touch with us by e-mail to mail@carnamah.com.au